Today, woke up at 9A, had no idea what time it was. The bunk on the boat is really dark. And a lot smaller than my hotel room was, mainly because its four bunks in the size of the bathroom in the hotel. But it’s an experience. My supervisor sounded jealous when I checked in that I arrived at my boat last night. And I don’t have to check in with her every day, just Danielle and Dad, but satellite service is kind of spotty, so we’ll see how well it goes.
It was nice, calm today. Maybe 1 to 2 foot seas. Clear, and there is a lot of stuff going on out at sea. Between the rigs and the other boats. Kind of interesting. The boat, is about 105 foot long, has two shrimp trawl nets, one on either side. They take about thirty minutes to get to the bottom, and we dragged for about an hour, to tug it back up it took another hour. Wow, my grammar has kind of slacked since I’ve been down here.
Anyways, our second tow, which we did around 9P to 10P we were about 40 miles from what the crew is calling “Ground Zero,” meaning the oilrig at MC252. Our first drag we found two samples, and the second was a clean drag, so I helped the NOAA people, actually, AIS Observers, separate shrimps species from each other so they could get their samples. Doesn’t seem like their purpose on the boat is about as easy as mine is. Not too bad though.
Tonight it was really dark out to sea. Normally you can tell the water from the sky, but out here it’s all the same shade of black. The back deck was also lit up so we could work, and it made it hard to see the stars. Aside from the lights of the rigs and other boats, there isn’t any other light out to sea. Especially with it being a waning moon.
Weather reports are calling for 7 foot seas and the temperature to drop. The captain is bringing us to shallow water to see if it’ll change in a day or so, if not we’re going to stay at anchor and possibly scrub the mission and go back to port. Still, being on an offshore vessel is really cool. Plus, it’s a few new tings to put on my resume, always a bonus.
